THT Daily: Yanks Sox Showdown
by Matthew CarruthApril 21, 2007
Major League News for April 21
Player News
Yesterday’s Results
Today’s Games
Standings
Top Minor League Performances
Stats
Player News
Player Headlines are courtesy of RotoworldJohnny Damon is questionable for Saturday's game against the Red Sox due to a sore back.
"I'm hoping my back is all right. I had trouble with it in Minnesota because of the turf," Damon said. "It doesn't feel as good as it should." Damon said he felt a "burning sensation" in his back in the eighth inning of Friday's game.
Joe Saunders, the only Virginia Tech alumnus currently in the majors, shut out the Mariners for six innings on Friday to move to 2-0.
Saunders received special permission from commissioner Bud Selig to wear the Virginia Tech cap during the game. The left-hander has a 1.96 ERA through three starts while filling in for the Angels' injured pitchers. However, he's set to lose to his rotation spot when Kelvim Escobar returns.
Craig Biggio hit his first grand slam in 13 years to break a 2-2 tie in the top of the ninth Friday in the Astros' defeat of the Brewers.
He entered with two homers in 166 career at-bats with the bases loaded. Biggio, who got his first day off of the season on Thursday, also drew his second walk of the year and stole his first base tonight. He's providing manager Phil Garner a good excuse for giving him at least one day off each week.
Alex Rodriguez continued his ridiculously torrid play, smashing another pair of long balls among a three-hit, three-run, four-RBI night on Friday.
A-Rod's blasts tie him with Mike Schmidt as the fastest to reach a dozen. Schmidt also hit 12 in the first 15 games back in 1976. Rodriguez is simply unconscious right now. He has hit in all 15 games this year, and 20 straight dating back to last year. Even his outs are long, as he flied to the warning track in his first at-bat. With 476 career dingers, Rodriguez has moved into the Top 25 of all time, passing Willie Stargell and Stan Musial on Friday. In addition to pacing the majors in long balls, A-Rod also tops baseball with 30 RBI and 65 total bases.
Jorge Posada left Friday's game against the Red Sox because of a bruised left thumb.
Posada was hurt catching an Andy Pettitte pitch. The Yankees took him in for precautionary X-rays, which came back negative. If Posada can't go Saturday Wil Nieves will start in his place.
Angels recalled first baseman Kendry Morales from Triple-A Salt Lake.
A surprise. Indications were that the Angels favored Brandon Wood to replace Howie Kendrick even before the third baseman had six hits the last two days. That gave Wood nearly a 250-point edge in OPS over Morales, who was hitting .291/.316/.382 in 55 at-bats. This probably means the Angels will go with Erick Aybar as a regular until Chone Figgins comes off the DL. Morales will share time with Shea Hillenbrand at DH.
Miguel Cabrera felt ready to play Friday, but manager Fredi Gonzalez has opted to rest him for a day.
Cabrera left Thursday's game with a mild oblique strain. He'll likely be back at third base on Saturday.
Miguel Cabrera says he has a mild right oblique strain, but he feels it's something he's capable of playing through.
"It's nothing serious," Cabrera said. "I want to play. It's just when I swing and miss, I feel something." Manager Fredi Gonzalez said it's 50/50 whether Cabrera will play Friday night against the Nationals. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel believes it's more likely he'll be held out of the lineup until Monday. Aaron Boone and Alfredo Amezaga could start in his place.
Randy Johnson (back) gave up two runs in six innings Thursday for Triple-A Tucson.
The runs came in the first two innings. Johnson allowed six hits, walked one and struck out seven. He appears set to come off the DL and face the Padres next week.
Rich Hill pitched eight scoreless innings to beat the Braves on Thursday and lower his ERA to 0.41.
Hill allowed four hits, walked three and struck out seven in improving to 3-0 in three starts. He's had the advantage of having the wind blowing in his last two times out, but since he's getting more grounders than he did last year, he might not be quite so vulnerable to the home run ball anyway. He could be one of the NL's top fantasy pitchers this year.
Yesterday’s Results
American League BAL 5 TOR 4 (Recap and Boxscore) BOS 7 NYA 6 (Recap and Boxscore) CLE 4 TB 3 (Recap and Boxscore) CHA 5 DET 4 (Recap and Boxscore) KC 11 MIN 7 (Recap and Boxscore) LAA 8 SEA 4 (Recap and Boxscore) OAK 16 TEX 4 (Recap and Boxscore) National League WAS 6 FLA 5 (Recap and Boxscore) ATL 7 NYN 3 (Recap and Boxscore) STL 2 CHN 1 (Recap and Boxscore) CIN 2 PHI 1 (Recap and Boxscore) HOU 6 MIL 5 (Recap and Boxscore) SD 11 COL 1 (Recap and Boxscore) LAN 10 PIT 2 (Recap and Boxscore) SF 4 ARI 2 (Recap and Boxscore)
Today’s Games
National League --------------- Atlanta Braves at New York Mets, 1:10 PM (L) Chuck James (2-1) vs. (L) Oliver Perez (1-1) St. Louis Cardinals at Chicago Cubs, 3:55 PM (R) Anthony Reyes (0-2) vs. (R) Jason Marquis (1-1) Arizona Diamondbacks at San Francisco Giants, 4:05 PM (R) Edgar Gonzalez (1-1) vs. (L) Barry Zito (1-2) Washington Nationals at Florida Marlins, 7:05 PM (L) Matt Chico (1-1) vs. (R) Anibal Sanchez (1-0) Houston Astros at Milwaukee Brewers, 7:05 PM (L) Wandy Rodriguez (0-1) vs. (L) Chris Capuano (2-0) Philadelphia Phillies at Cincinnati Reds, 7:10 PM (L) Cole Hamels (1-0) vs. (L) Eric Milton (0-2) San Diego Padres at Colorado Rockies, 8:05 PM (R) Clay Hensley (0-3) vs. (L) Jeff Francis (1-1) Pittsburgh Pirates at Los Angeles Dodgers, 10:10 PM (R) Ian Snell (1-1) vs. (R) Brad Penny (3-0) American League --------------- Chicago White Sox at Detroit Tigers, 1:05 PM (R) Jose Contreras (1-2) vs. (L) Nate Robertson (2-1) Minnesota Twins at Kansas City Royals, 2:10 PM (R) Boof Bonser (0-1) vs. (R) Zack Greinke (1-2) New York Yankees at Boston Red Sox, 3:55 PM (R) Jeffrey Karstens (0-0) vs. (R) Josh Beckett (3-0) Toronto Blue Jays at Baltimore Orioles, 7:05 PM (R) Josh Towers (1-1) vs. (L) Adam Loewen (1-0) Cleveland Indians at Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 7:10 PM (R) Paul Byrd (1-0) vs. (R) Jae Seo (0-1) Oakland Athletics at Texas Rangers, 8:05 PM (L) Joe Kennedy (0-1) vs. (R) Kameron Loe (0-0) Seattle Mariners at LA Angels of Anaheim, 9:05 PM (L) Horacio Ramirez (1-0) vs. (R) Bartolo Colon (0-0)
Standings
The graphics next to each team are called "sparklines.” They depict each team’s performance over the last month. Each "up" bar is a victory and a "down" bar is a loss. There are horizontal lines for home games and red bars represent games decided by two runs or less. "PWins" is short for Projected Wins, based on each team’s Run Differential, and is often a better measure of a team’s true strength. Other team graphs and stats can be found on our Team Page.American League East Pwins Diff BOS 10 5 .667 0.0 11 -1BAL 9 7 .563 1.5 8 1
NYA 8 7 .533 2.0 10 -2
TOR 8 8 .500 2.5 9 -1
TB 6 10 .375 4.5 6 0
American League Central MIN 10 6 .625 0.0 9 1
DET 9 7 .563 1.0 9 0
CLE 7 6 .538 1.5 6 1
CHA 8 7 .533 1.5 7 1
KC 5 11 .313 5.0 6 -1
American League West OAK 9 7 .563 0.0 10 -1
LAA 7 9 .438 2.0 7 0
SEA 5 7 .417 2.0 5 0
TEX 6 10 .375 3.0 6 0
National League East Pwins Diff ATL 11 5 .688 0.0 9 2
NYN 10 5 .667 0.5 12 -2
FLA 6 10 .375 5.0 7 -1
WAS 6 11 .353 5.5 5 1
PHI 4 11 .267 6.5 6 -2
National League Central HOU 9 6 .600 0.0 8 1
MIL 9 7 .563 0.5 8 1
CIN 9 8 .529 1.0 8 1
STL 7 9 .438 2.5 7 0
PIT 6 9 .400 3.0 6 0
CHN 6 10 .375 3.5 9 -3
National League West LAN 12 5 .706 0.0 12 0
SD 10 7 .588 2.0 9 1
ARI 10 8 .556 2.5 9 1
SF 7 8 .467 4.0 7 0
COL 7 10 .412 5.0 7 0
Top Minor League Games
The following list, provided by First Inning, includes the top minor league batting (based on Runs Created) and pitching (based on Game Score) performances from yesterday.ORG LVL PLAYER POS AB H 2B 3B HR BB SO Notes ARI A+ Brandon Burgess 3B 4 3 1 0 1 1 1 ATL AA Brandon Jones LF 2 2 0 0 1 2 0 BOS AA Jacoby Ellsbury CF 5 4 1 2 0 0 0 CIN A Chris Valaika SS 5 4 1 1 0 0 1 3 runs scored LAA A Peter Bourjos CF 4 4 0 1 0 1 0 MIL AAA Brad Nelson 1B 5 4 1 0 1 0 0 NYM A+ Jose Castro SS 4 4 0 0 1 0 0 NYY AAA Alberto Gonzalez SS 3 3 0 1 0 0 0 SEA AA Matt Tuiasosopo 3B 3 3 0 1 0 1 0 ORG LVL PLAYER IP H R ER SO BB HR Notes BAL A Bradley Bergesen 7.0 2 1 1 9 0 0 1 ER allowed over last 19 IP BOS AAA David Pauley 6.0 2 0 0 9 2 0 1.00 ERA over past month CHC A Jose Ceda 6.0 2 0 0 5 0 0 COL A+ Brandon Hynick 7.0 3 0 0 3 0 0 MIL A Zach Braddock 5.2 4 0 0 12 0 0 MIN AAA Scott Baker 8.0 2 0 0 8 0 0 NYM A+ Bobby Parnell 6.0 2 0 0 9 2 0 20 K over last 15 IP PHI A C. Monasterios 7.0 2 0 0 3 2 0 WAN A+ John Lannan 6.0 1 0 0 5 1 0
Stats
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Matthew Carruth is an editor for The Hardball Times. He welcomes any and all sorts of communication at his email.